Was The Soul Stone In 'Black Panther'? The Sixth Infinity Stone May Have Subtly Appeared

With Avengers: Infinity War on the horizon, Marvel fans went into Black Panther looking for any clues about the biggest question surrounding the upcoming major team-up: where the hell is the Soul Stone? We all know that the six Infinity Stones will be at the center of Infinity War, and previous Marvel movies have already revealed the location of five of the six stones. Since Black Panther is the final movie before Infinity War, many fans were expecting it to finally reveal the Soul Stone. So, was the Soul Stone in Black Panther? Not explicitly, but some fans think it might be hiding in plain sight in the new movie.

Before we get into Black Panther, a brief overview of the Infinity Stones: where they are and how they will be involved in Avengers: Infinity War. As the first Avengers: Infinity War trailer shows, the new big bad will be an intergalactic warlord named Thanos, who arrives on Earth in search of the six Infinity Stones. These stones have proven their incredible powers individually in previous Marvel movies, and if Thanos succeeds in collecting all of them, they will make him totally unstoppable. That is why the big question going into the new movie for everyone is where each of the stones are located.

Five of the six Infinity Stones are accounted for. You can check out a more in-depth overview of where each Infinity Stone is currently located here, but in short: Loki has the Space Stone, Vision has the Mind Stone, The Collector has the Reality Stone, Nova Corps has the Power Stone, and Doctor Strange has the Time Stone locked away in Kamar-Taj. But we have yet to see the Soul Stone appear in a Marvel movie. Since the Infinity War trailer is heavily set in Wakanda, fans were assuming that Black Panther would finally reveal the final stone's location within the mystical African country. That didn't happen, though... or at least, not in a clear-cut way. There are some theories floating around that the Soul Stone may have actually played a role in Black Panther without us knowing about it.

SPOILER ALERT: Don't read on if you haven't seen Black Panther yet and want to remain unspoiled. There are a couple convincing theories about how the Soul Stone appeared in Black Panther. The one that seemed most likely for most of the movie was that the Soul Stone was the orange sand within Wakanda's palace that the people use to bury their new leaders so that they may commune with their ancestors.

Remember that the Infinity Stones can take any form: though most of the stones we've seen have been solid gems, the Reality Stone is a viscous liquid, so the Soul Stone could very well be a sandy expanse. Not only do the colors match (the Soul Stone is also orange), but the sand also displayed the supernatural abilities of the Soul Stone by allowing T'Challa and Killmonger to enter a spirit world to speak with their dead fathers. However, a major wrench is thrown in this theory towards the end of the movie. When Nakia, Ramonda, and Everett Ross find a powerless T'Challa being taken care of by the Jabari Tribe, they are able to reconnect him to the spirit world by burying him in snow rather than the palace's orange sand. If the Jabari snow can do the same thing, then I guess there really wasn't anything special about that orange sand.

Another theory that seems to hold up better is that the Soul Stone was inside the Vibranium meteor that initially created Wakanda, and as such, it could be within all of the Vibranium in the country. To an extent, this theory would basically make all of Wakanda the Soul Stone, which may sound kind of crazy, but it would explain Vibranium's almost-too-incredible properties and how the country's soil can allow those buried in it to communicate with the dead. It would also explain why Thanos is showing up in Wakanda in the Infinity War trailer.

Since Black Panther didn't offer any clear answers about the Soul Stone, we will have to wait until Avengers: Infinity War hits theaters on May 4 to get truth about this elusive stone.